Alpine Episode
by X6Herbius
Summary: This was a piece of creative writing I did at school on an English course. It's not meant to fit into any part of Half Life, just to be standalone and a bit of fun. Alyx and Dog get up to a couple of antics here; enjoy!


"Where the hell are we?"

The forest was thick on all sides, the tall, white-coated pine trees filtering the sunlight to form an ever-moving pattern of glittering orange and shade. Alyx looked around to get her bearings, listening for the sound she was hoping for. There were a couple of birds fluttering around in the thick foliage above; the road they had travelled by stretched out in both directions, but there was no roar of water, no fine diamond spray lifting from a chasm in a parting of trees.

"I don't understand…we must be getting close. We've been travelling all day."

She looked up at Dog, her rather large, metal, robot-like companion. He game a machine-like whine and lifted his jointed head, searching for the waterfall they needed to find, and shuffled slightly on the snowy floor.

"Well, we can't stand here forever." Alyx ran a cold hand through her brown, unbrushed hair held back by a single red headband and sighed. "Let's keep moving. We need to find this place by nightfall, or who knows what might happen"

Dog bleeped in agreement. Alyx returned to the old winding road they had been following for the past five hours and climbed unceremoniously back into the rusty, battered, metal frame of an ATV they had brought along with them. All this travelling, going on and on, and they still hadn't found the waterfall… She thought a natural phenomenon that big would be unmissable, but the trees of the forest they were travelling through were so densely packed together that the view between them was severely limited. So far they'd found a couple of caves, a deserted log cabin and the site of an old crashed aircraft but nothing else particularly of interest. Alyx was beginning to get desperate: it was already three o'clock in the afternoon, according to her watch, and they only had an hour of decent sunlight left before…well, she hoped they wouldn't get to that stage.

Alyx shivered and pulled her fur coat tighter around her. Alpine winters were extremely cold, this one being no exception, and according to the small multifunction gadget radar attached to the frame of the ATV the current temperature was negative five degrees. They'd better get moving. She turned the ignition key and called out into the snowy forest:

"Hey, Dog! You coming?"

A few moments passed before Dog clattered out of the foliage, sending a dusting of snow cascading from the tree branches. He shook his metal head slightly and bounded over to the car.

"You go on ahead, alright?" Alyx smiled. "See if you can spot anything. We've really got to get a move on now, it's beginning to get late."

Dog gave a few musical bleeps, turned and thundered off down the road, his metal limbs making quite a noise against the icy concrete. Alyx accelerated to follow him and pushed a gloved hand forward on the gear stick. She looked up anxiously at the weak, orange sun just visible over the alpine treetops; time really was of the essence.

Frosty minutes went by; there was no other sound than the continuous clatter of Dog's "feet" and the slightly stuttering purr of the ATV's diesel engine. More snow-topped trees went by; Alyx had no idea where they were any more and hadn't for the past half an hour, since all the gadget radar showed was an endless block of trees either side of them. In a way it was rather surprising that this wrack of a car was still moving; the only solid part of it left was the chassis as the doors, roof and most of the floor were all missing. The pedals were attached to the bare frame of the vehicle and she couldn't guess how old the engine was, although it had seemed to work fine for them, for the most part –

As this thought flowed through Alyx's mind, a cough and stutter erupted from the tired, rusting engine in the bare bonnet. Suddenly alert, Alyx leaned forward through the glassless front window frame to see what the trouble was, but was shaken by a second splutter that sent a shake through the rusty chassis. Worried, she began to brake carefully so as not to skid on the icy road but there was no need; the engine gave one last puff of exhaust and died as the car rolled slowly to a stop.

Alyx climbed out of the vehicle and called after Dog. "Hey, boy! Wait up!"

Dog immediately turned his head to see what the problem was; seeing Alyx standing by the broken-down ATV he attempted to do a U-turn at speed on the frosty concrete but it was more slippery than he anticipated. Overbalancing completely, the eight-foot robotic machine keeled over onto the ground and slid a few metres further before coming to an abrupt halt against the thick trunk of a pine tree. Consequently, a large percentage of the snow delicately sitting on the branches above cascaded downwards and ended up creating something that looked remarkably similar to a tangle of children's climbing frames covered in a layer of icing sugar.

Alyx rushed as quickly and carefully as she could to the frosted pile of metal by the side of the road. "Dog! Oh my God, are you alright?"

Dog gave a metallic groan and lifted himself up off the floor. Jumping onto his feet he shook himself clean from the cold white dusting and turned back to face Alyx. He gave a few affectionate synthesised whines as she brushed the remaining ice of his frame and they both began to make their way back to the broken-down car.

"You've gotta be careful, Boy! These icy roads are lethal."

Dog dropped his head in apology. As they approached the ATV, however, Alyx noticed a growing pool of liquid underneath the front of the vehicle and hurried over to examine it.

"That doesn't look good. Dog, I think we've sprung a leak."

Alyx bent down, un-gloved one hand and dipped a finger into the cold, slightly congealed substance. She sniffed the liquid, sighed and wiped her finger on the front of the car.

"Smells like fuel: I think one of our pipes' split. Looks like the mountains were too tough for our old rustbucket.

Dog gave a small groan of disappointment. Alyx stood up, wrapped her coat better around her and turned to her companion.

"Looks like we'll be walking from here."


End file.
